


Ember Days

by thepointoftheneedle



Series: Dazed With Moonlight [2]
Category: Riverdale (TV 2017)
Genre: College AU, F/M, mention of historic domestic violence, mention of inquisition, mostly cat puns and spells, witchy au
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-28
Updated: 2020-06-30
Packaged: 2021-03-04 02:26:52
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 13,400
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24962254
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thepointoftheneedle/pseuds/thepointoftheneedle
Summary: The continuing adventures of Jughead the ex-cat and his witch Betty.  They finish senior year and go to college.  I have worked up my Dazed With Moonlight drabbles in the first chapter of this but after that... all new cat adventures.  Bret is still a piece of work.  Donna is cruel to a canary.
Relationships: Betty Cooper/Jughead Jones
Series: Dazed With Moonlight [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1806652
Comments: 90
Kudos: 119
Collections: 7th Bughead Fanfiction Awards - Nominees





	1. This Year

**Author's Note:**

> The chapter title is a song by The mighty Mountain Goats.  
> "Locking eyes  
> Holding hands  
> Twin high maintenance machines  
> I am going to make it through this year  
> If it kills me"

A slow song was playing as couples swayed together in the soft light, too tired to do more than shuffle their feet, kissing and whispering endearments. She took his hand knowing that, even though he loathed dancing, he wouldn’t refuse her. He grumbled a little but she whispered, “Less of the cattitude Jones,” and he smiled in spite of himself. They stepped out onto a deserted terrace, heavy with the scent of the exotic plants that were Mrs Blossom’s passion, to move together in a slow, rotating embrace. She was already nostalgic for what was slipping through their fingers. Senior year. Done. Final exams, check. Prom, check. Photographs, check. Tassels turned, check. More photographs, caps thrown, still more photographs, check, check, check. Now most of the class of 2020 would have to adult for fifty or sixty years at which point they’d be allowed to buy toys, eat candy and dress in pants with elasticated waists again. But for now, the world awaited them…responsibilities, degrees, jobs, mortgages, marriages, kids. Of course, she mused, if you happen to be a witch trying to negotiate all that with only one foot in the everyday, temporal world while the other slipped and slid uncertainly amid spells and incantations, it was just flat out scary. Fortunately she was not alone. She had Jughead, boyfriend, best friend, familiar, ex-cat with whom to negotiate it all. He had been part of every good memory that she would take from this year. From his transubstantiation in the forest to this moment, shambling around to sentimental music, at what Cheryl was calling the graduation kegger to end all graduation keggers, he’d been her constant strength.

Back in September, when she felt overwhelmed by what she’d taken on, he’d been there to help. She’d sat on the bed, papers, files, books, post-its strewn around her, her hair scraped into a ponytail so tight that he said it made his head ache in sympathy. “You need to take a break Betts. You can’t do five AP classes, run the Blue and Gold and learn all there is to know about casting in the same year. No-one could.”

“And compile the yearbook and chair the prom committee and try to seduce my tease of a boyfriend.” 

“I told you. Nothing will give me greater pleasure than to deflower you in a very thorough way once you’re a legal adult with a high school diploma. I’m eighty Betts. It’s creepy by any measure but an octogenarian sexing a high schooler is just so wrong.”

“The cat years don’t count. If we just count human years you’re what? Nineteen?”

“Nineteen in October.”

“Next month? What date? We’ll have a huge party, I’ll organise it. I can bake a cake.”

“Betts, stop. You can’t take on any more. Anyway I’d rather not make it a whole thing. It just reminds me that I’m way too old for you. Double feature, popcorn, you in a low cut top is all I need to be perfectly content. Now, I’m going to give you an hour to wrap all this up and then we’re going to Pop’s for milkshakes. No arguments.”

When they’d arrived at the diner Archie and Veronica were already in a booth, Veronica laughing and Archie looking frustrated. “What’s up?” Jug had asked looking from one to the other.

“We’re playing two truths and a lie. Archie just lost because he didn’t believe that my sister is a PI in Florida.”

“You’ve never once mentioned a sister in the eight months we’ve been dating. How can you suddenly have a sister?” Archie wailed. .

“OK Betty, your turn,” Veronica laughed.

“Umm, OK. Jughead’s eighty years old, I’m a witch and he’s upset with me because I won’t throw him a birthday party.”

“No Betty. Two truths and one lie. And you have to make it hard to guess. Honestly, haven’t you ever played this game before? Torombolo, do you want me to organise the soiree for your cumpleaños?”

He didn’t. Instead of the double feature she’d persuaded the manager at The Bijou to rescreen “Cats" and he’d laughed so hard from the opening credits that she thought they’d be thrown out. “But where are their genitals Betts?” he’d gasped, tears rolling down his face. “Why do they keep changing size?” he’d hiccupped. “She’s unzipping her fucking skin Betty. It’s a musical body shock horror flick. It’s Cronenberg on Broadway. I love it. And I love you.” When Jennyanydots repeated the trick he’d slid off his seat onto the floor, holding his stomach, in genuine pain from the laughing. It was infectious; she’d emerged with her jaw aching from her giggling. 

Now he held her tight as they moved to the music and she rested her head against his warm chest. He’d been the one to teach her spells, explain lore and help her make connections in the magical world this year by meeting other witches even if only virtually. He’d shown her there was another world just behind the temporal reality she’d known. One night she’d knocked “Shave and a haircut” at the trailer door and he’d called “It’s open Betts” and closed the lid of his laptop as she came in. “Not more cat porn Jug?” she teased.

“It’s not porn. Lots of people like cat videos. I will not be shamed.”

“You know I was into you when you were a cat, so kink same not kink shame. But here’s your girl trying so hard to get into your jeans and you’re drooling over pretty kitties online.”

“Hey, I wasn’t even watching cat vids. I was chatting to some of the guys. Just gets a bit irritating when they keep making typos but I know it’s tough with paws. And Silas has to really jump on the keys, Nana Blossom can’t help him at all.”

“What, you talk to other familiars online? Like a chatroom? Is there a witch one?”

“I guess. Agnes wasn’t all that into keeping in touch with other witches and she never really got into tech stuff so I don’t know. You want I should ask the guys?”

“Yeah, I’d really like witch pals to vent with. Ask them next time. For now I want you to pay attention to me. Shall I play with a ball of yarn to get you interested or shall I just take off my top?”

“You, Cooper, are a witch.”

“Correct,” she smiled, unbuttoning her blouse. He’d let her but when she reached around to unfasten her bra he’d held her wrist gently. “Hey Betts. I’m only human, these days at least. Please don’t make it harder to resist you.”

“Oh I wouldn’t want to make it harder,” she’d said, staring into his eyes as her double entendre hit home. He huffed out a breath and kissed her passionately but that was as far as it went. “Are you pawsitive that I can’t purrsuade you?” she said when the kiss ended and he had the good grace to laugh as he assured her that he was pawfully sure about it. Everyone assumed they were already “intimate,” as her mother put it when she took her to the clinic, and she didn’t feel like putting them right.

She’d introduced herself to the other witches in a WhatsApp group and they’d welcomed her. They shared love potions like her mom shared recipes for key lime pie with her friends, they talked about the difficulty of ethically monetising the craft and the administration of their Etsy shops. When they griped about their familiars, their litter trays or their feeding habits, and she let slip that Jug was a human, they seemed a little shocked. He’d told her human familiars were unusual but their reactions were so disconcerting that she just didn’t mention him much after that. 

He was a great boyfriend if a little undemonstrative in public which was why she hadn’t expected some elaborate promposal. But then he didn’t ask her at all. She was disappointed but, as an independent witch of the 2020s she asked him. She’d thought it was a formality, but no.

“Sorry Betts. I can’t.” He looked upset. He ran his long fingers through his hair.

“But I don’t understand why. What’s the problem?” She’d been looking forward to it so much, to being one of the girls who got it right, beautiful dress, hot boyfriend.

“It’s in the fucking gym.”

“Look I know you hate sports. Coordination is going to be a problem. You were a cat for sixty years. It’ll take some adjustment but you cant be so phobic about exercise that you’ll miss the prom just to avoid entering a gym.”

“The centre circle,” he mumbled, staring at his boots.

At last she’d understood. When a cat sees a circle they are compelled to sit in it, powerless to move. 

“It’s a good thing I’m in charge of decorations then,” she’d grinned, and googled drop cloths to cover the floor.

They’d gone to prom, danced, made out in the car in the parking lot afterwards but when she’d brazenly put her hand on the front of his suit pants he’d groaned and moved it away. “Juggie,” she’d whined.

But he’d stuck to his word. “Graduate first,” he said, “Please, don’t push it. I’m just trying to do what’s right.” Betty reflected on how she’d feel if a boy pushed one of her friends when she said no and, although it was tough, she respected his red lines. It didn’t mean that she stopped dreaming about him.

Now he held her in his arms and she had fulfilled her side of the bargain. She had her diploma. This might be the night. Even if it wasn’t she knew that it would happen. They were off to college together much to Veronica’s perplexity since she couldn’t fathom how Jug with a GPA below 3.0 and no advantageous connections to TV stars or billionaires had wangled an acceptance to Harvard. Betty had said something about special programmes for underprivileged youth and a wonderful admission essay and V had shrugged and changed the subject, knowing that something was awry but lacking the inclination to interrogate them further. Betty reflected on how much better the world would be if a good essay and a hard luck story were really all it took to secure admission to a top flight Ivy League College. She recalled the evening early in the year when, surrounded by college brochures, she looked at Jug and knew that he wanted to say something but was biting his rough cat tongue. “Spit it out Jones. What?”

“I don’t know whether I should suggest another possibility or if I should just give you the space to make this choice on your own. I want you to go wherever you choose.”

“Giving me more options is never a bad thing. Speak up.”

“Had you thought about Harvard? Pretty good school.”

“Well, obviously it’s a good school. Arguably the best school. I doubt I’d get in. Why?”

“OK so you said options… you could go to one of these places,” he gestured at the brochures, “take your degree, major in psych, great, sound life goals. Or there are places where you can go and just study casting, degree level transmutation, potions, necromancy, whatever. Useful in witch circles, not so much if you want to become a therapist or a social worker. Or the third route, there are institutions that started up before there was this split between the magical and the secular worlds. You know back when Newton could dabble in astrology and alchemy alongside optics and the theory of gravity. Le Sorbonne, Oxford, Bologna, Harvard.. So if you went there you could do a Psych degree but they also have, let’s call them arcane, extra curricular courses, where you can learn the craft. And given that you are both brilliant and talented I bet you’d get in. And I could come with.”

“How? I’m not being mean Jug but we didn’t gild the lily when we conjured that transcript for Mrs Bell. Your GPA is going to be on the low side even if you pass everything this year. And even then I think we might have to ease your grade a little in algebra. How did you even get an F in algebra?”

“There was this stupid puzzle about a girl, a boy and a dog walking somewhere and I fleshed out the backstory instead of working out the problem. Anyway the admissions department wouldn’t separate a witch and her familiar. I’d get in on your grades. Maybe I shouldn’t have mentioned it. You might want some freedom to have the whole college experience on your own. If you want to go to Yale or NYU or wherever, I’ll be fine here. I’ll get a job and we can Zoom and text and… we’ll work it out.”

“Oh my God Jug, I hadn’t even thought that you’d stay here. No, that’s not possible. You have to come. But if we do this we get to work together, even have classes together?”

He’d grinned in obvious relief and she’d grabbed the laptop to get an application started. Later, after they’d both got their acceptance letters, he told her that for a familiar to be separated from their witch for any length of time was physically painful, like a bad ‘flu that just doesn’t get better. He’d kept that quiet until she’d chosen for herself.

“What are you thinking about Cooper, smiling away like that?” he asked now, on the last night of their high school experience, as they dragged their feet in time to the music. 

“You,” she said, looking up into those arresting blue eyes. “Thanks Jug. You made senior year fun. I can’t wait til September. Freedom, no-one to tell me to keep the door open three inches.”

“Ah but roommates. I’m too old for that shit you know. Some terrible dude bro lifting weights and jerking off at all hours. Or worse a Mark Zuckerberg frantically coding in the desperate hope it’ll get him laid one day. And most sickeningly it will.”

“Speaking of which...I graduated. Are you going to pay up and put out at last? I want to be wanton.”

Abruptly Jug’s eyes jerked towards the doorway. Nana Blossom had appeared silhouetted in a way that she must surely have calculated to produce the most ominous effect.

“Hey dude… Miss Roseanne,” Jug said. Betty was confused until she realised, as the old lady wheeled towards them, that what she would have taken for an elaborate brooch on Nana Blossom’s blouse was actually a live beetle. Nana reached up and tickled Jug under his chin, “Who’s a pretty puss cat? He’s a pretty puss. Good puss.” Jug simply tolerated it, an embarrassed expression on his face. 

“Hello Nana, are you well?” asked Betty in an attempt to draw her focus to herself. 

“Oooh,” Nana said, a terrible grimace that seemed to serve as a simulacrum of a smile on her face as she looked up at her. “Oooh yabyum. Lucky girl.” She cackled and Betty looked at Jug in bewilderment only to find his face scarlet and his eyes darting anywhere but to her own. Nana hadn’t finished creeping them out yet though. She grabbed Betty’s wrist in her gnarled claw and pulled until Betty was compelled to either sacrifice a hand or bring her face down to Nana’s, so close she could see the scarab’s antennae and forelegs waving, decades worth of Nana’s face powder congealed in the wrinkles on her face, a cobweb in her chignon. “Elizabeth, sister, you should know he’s like Houdini only opposite. Remember that. Puss will help.” She cackled as she released Betty and spun the wheelchair with terrifying adroitness and sped back into the house.

“What the hell?” Betty asked her still clearly shaken boyfriend. “Was she babbling or did any of that mean anything?”

“She’s old. Like I said, they get confused. But she’s a prognosticator. So it might mean something or it might just be rambling. Houdini was a warlock who let people think it was all stagecraft rather than witchcraft Not popular in arcane circles, selling the craft, cheapening it, mocking it. And it came back and took its revenge. He had a pretty sad life.”

“What about…was it yabyum? Was that prattle? Why am I lucky?” He flushed again, shuffling his feet. “Tell me Jug. Or I’ll have to ask the witchy WhatsApp.”

“Oh God, don’t do that. I expect they already disapprove of me. Witches tend to be suspicious of human familiars; I think they feel threatened. OK, it’s Tibetan sex magic. Like Tantric practice, achieving insight and power through communion with a partner. There’s sacred art, pretty graphic stuff, at least it seemed graphic before the internet…Nowadays, well!” Betty was blushing now too. 

“Tantric? Isn’t that where it goes on all day? Is that… is it something we could do?”

“Jeeze Betty, way to give a guy performance anxiety. I haven’t done it in sixty years. We’ll be lucky if it lasts ten seconds.” He grinned lopsidedly at her and looked at her through the dark serpentine curl that fell forward into his eyes when he was feeling shy and she broke into peals of giggles.

“But we’re going to try are we? Now?”

“Eager much? Well I dunno. What do you want? We can book a room at the Five Seasons if you like. Champagne, roses?”

“God, no thanks. I’m already nervous. Let’s just try to be normal about it. Your place.”

“If you’re nervous we don’t have to…We can wait as long as you like. No pressure at all.”

“No, I’m nervous that I’ll be bad. I’ll disappoint you. That I won’t be worth the wait.”

“Oh Betty. It’s not possible. I love you and I want to have this with you, and if you want to know about bad sex, google how cats do it.”

“Did you…when you were a cat?”

“God no! You joke about cat porn but cat sex is awful. Look I’ll just say penile spines and we’ll draw a veil and never speak of it again. I was in the wrong body. I didn’t suddenly start lusting over domestic pets. How weird would that be?”

“Yeah, sorry. I hadn’t thought it through. Spines? Really? They’ve gone right? Because your tongue…”

“Don’t worry. I’ve checked the functioning of the mechanism. No spines. I think I’ve got a spell for the tongue. We’ll see if we need it…”

When they got to the trailer he opened the door and stood aside to let her go in first. There was a lump in her throat when she saw that he’d put a string of twinkle lights over the window and a new air freshener along with a small bunch of carnations in a vase on the table. “Oh Juggie. You knew I wouldn’t want the Five Seasons didn’t you? “

“Yeah, I guess so. Do you want a drink? I have coke or wine cooler.”

“Too smooth Mr Jones. I’ll get to thinking you bring conquests back here all the time.”

“Only you Cooper.”

Later, back home, in her bed, she remembered how nervous he’d been, how desperate to make sure she wasn’t scared or in pain and her heart seemed to expand with loving him. There hadn’t been any Tantric sex magic, the fabric of the universe had stayed intact but she felt like they’d started an adventure together and she was keen to see where it would take them. She remembered how she’d sat next to him on the threadbare couch, holding his hand, stroking her thumb over his beautiful brow line as she looked into his eyes, how he’d kissed her until she felt like making love couldn’t be any more intimate. His hands gently on her breasts, looking at her so intently, whispering that he couldn’t love her more, couldn’t want her more. He’d let her touch him, his head thrown back against the couch cushion as he trembled. She hadn’t known what to do but she asked him to teach her and he’d taken her hand in his and shown her. They’d moved into the bedroom and he’d undressed her like she was a precious thing, so gentle when he touched her. She’d been over eager, keen to get beyond what he’d done for her before when he’d touched her with his fingers but he kept telling her that she needed to go slow or it would hurt her. When she didn’t think she could bear it any longer, when she was thrashing and whining for him he’d reached into a drawer for a condom and she’d told him there was no need, told him about the clinic and he’d sighed. “Could have avoided that humiliating trip to the drugstore then. I really miss the savoir faire I used to have as a cat.” In Polly’s dirtiest romance books there was lots of pounding and thrusting, exhausting sounding pumping. It wasn’t like that at all. He’d been so slow, so measured, so controlled, looking into her eyes. “Just say stop. You don’t have to endure anything. If it’s bad just tell me. You have to promise to tell me.” But it hadn’t been bad, it had been odd and strange and then it had been amazing and she’d been pushing against him to make him go faster, deeper, moaning and gasping and not caring how it made her look or sound. Then she saw that he was staring at the wall behind the bed, his lips moving and she was worried that it wasn’t good. She’d reached up and pulled his chin down to look at her. 

“What? What are you doing?”

“Trying… to remember …the ingredients for Agnes’ haemorrhoids charm. Oh fuck…I can’t hold on much…so good…” He was losing the iron control and that made her unbelievably excited and she thrust up to meet him as he reached down, touching her and saying that he loved her over and over like an incantation. There was a tension growing in her brain that seemed to shake up her insides like a can of soda until her body couldn’t contain it anymore and the ring pull was tugged and everything exploded. She cried out wordlessly. “Thank God,” he muttered and she could feel a kind of fluttering inside herself and he collapsed over her, keeping his weight off on one elbow.

He seemed exhausted and she pulled him against her, his head pushing against her shoulder as she stroked his hair over and over again until he seemed to recover a little. 

“Are you OK? I didn’t hurt you did I? Are you bleeding? Hey you need to go and pee or you’ll get an infection.”

“So romantic. No, you didn’t hurt me. You were wonderful to me. It was wonderful. Veronica said it would probably be bad the first time but it wasn’t at all.”

“You talked to Veronica about it? Embarrassing. Hey, you’re not going to tell her…”

“Of course I am,” she giggled as she got up to use the bathroom. “I’m going to tell her that my boyfriend is a stud, if I ever stop having sex with you for long enough to call her. I was a little worried about the spines, not gonna lie.”

The summer stretched ahead of them with seemingly endless possibilities. They went to the swimming hole with Archie and Veronica in the jalopy although Jug slept in the shade refusing to even countenance joining them in the water. Once Archie grabbed him and threw him in as a joke and he seemed almost to tread on the surface of the water as he scrambled out, dripping and furious, sulking on the shore for the rest of the day until Archie fetched the icebox and revealed ice cream sandwiches which somewhat placated him. There were picnics by Sweetwater River which usually ended back at his trailer, wrapped in each other, murmuring plans for the future in low voices. They went to Pop’s with a crowd of other departing seniors, promising to keep in touch and knowing as they did it, that they probably wouldn’t. Betty visited her grandparents for a week and Jughead pined and worked on an enchantment that let them communicate through a bowl of dew gathered at the equinox and which she pointed out could have been achieved via FaceTime with much less effort. He said that wasn’t the point and got offended when she didn’t see what the point was. Then it was August and Archie was leaving for Annapolis. It was strange to think she’d look out of the window and the room across the way would be dark and empty but when Jug pointed out that in two weeks her room would be the same she was overwhelmed by nostalgia and wept a little. He let her feel it, stroking her back and kissing her, occasionally forgetting himself and licking her hair and then spluttering in confusion. Then they were three for the last weeks of the summer, trying to keep Veronica from falling too deeply into missing “Archiekins”, stealing moments alone together when she was with her parents or packing for college. Soon it was their day to leave. Betty and her parents packed up the station wagon with their worldly chattels and Jug roared up on his bike to follow them to Cambridge. It was less like going to Hogwarts and more like being ripped out of a picture that she had only come to see as beautiful when it was time to destroy it. As she checked her room for the last time, the nostalgia palpable, she murmured, “Agnes, is that you?” and pulled the door closed behind her.


	2. Old College Try

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The chapter title is a song by The Mountain Goats.  
> "But I will walk down to the end with you  
> If you will come all the way down with me"

Move in day at Harvard was more orderly than she had expected but then she supposed they’d had almost four centuries to practice. The Coopers pulled up at her dorm to find Jug leaning against the bike, waiting. She saw several girls and quite a few guys looking lasciviously at the hot biker in black leather and so she hopped out of the station wagon and kissed him emphatically until her mom reprimanded her. “You’ll get a reputation as a floozy Elizabeth. Put him down at once.” Satisfied that she had irrefutably staked her claim, she did as she was told, noting with interest that her assertiveness had clearly pushed his buttons as he shuffled and cleared his throat to hide his excitement. Senior students had been allocated to help them unload their possessions, Betty’s helper turning on the stairs to introduce herself as Joan and identify herself as a fellow witch. “They pair up arcane students in dorm rooms; if you were with a temporal it’d be hard to keep your casting secret. And there were ... accidents that were hard to explain.” Betty and Jug waved goodbye to her parents and reluctantly agreed to go their separate ways for at least a day so they could acclimate to dorm life and stand some chance of making friends with others in their entryways. She watched him slink away across the grass, already missing him.

When she got back to her dorm, her roommate, a preppy brunette, had arrived with her canary familiar in a cage and was hanging a huge poster of a movie called Black Narcissus over her bed. Jug would be able to make some smart film reference about it but she had nothing but a cheery disposition to share. “Hi, I’m Betty. It’s great to meet you,” she smiled.

“I’m Donna. You aren’t planning to make friends with me like you did with the biker guy downstairs are you? You certainly put on a show.”

Betty felt herself blush but guessed that there was a chance that Donna was trying to make a friendly joke. She wasn’t going to get off on the wrong foot with the girl with whom she’d have to spend at least the next year in close quarters. “He’s actually my boyfriend. I didn’t just kiss a stranger on move in day. That’d be weird.”

“Pretty weird to introduce yourself to an academic community by showing everyone how far you can get your tongue down some hoodlum’s throat but, as they say, each to her own. I know some people are turned on by exhibitionism so… you do you. Anyway, I have a mixer to go to. Later. Oh, if you’re going to fellate one of your hookups in here, can you be done by seven? Great.” She swept out and Betty stood in the middle of the room, dumbstruck, tearful and as mad as Hecate. She swept up her phone to call Jug but then thought better of it. There was nothing he could do and she’d just upset him when he needed to be bonding with his roommate, hopefully better than she’d managed.

Over the next twenty four hours there were various mixers and group orientation sessions. Unsurprisingly Jug wasn’t in any of the same groups as her. She kept having the unsettling experience of walking into rooms and seeing Donna talking to a group who would turn and look at her as she approached. Often they’d smirk or giggle and disperse. She had always been pretty popular in school, not terrifyingly popular like Cheryl, but she’d never felt bullied or excluded until now. After one of the gatherings she sat on a quiet staircase, too vulnerable to go back to her dorm room to be tormented by Donna, sobbing with disappointment and fury like a kindergartener who’d been told she wasn’t welcome on the jungle gym. Of course Jug chose that moment to call. She swallowed hard and answered, trying to sound perky and full of pep. “Juggie, hi there. What’cha doing?”

“Why are you crying? What’s wrong? Are you sick?” She should have known she couldn’t kid him, he had her number.

“Nothing, just a weird vibe in my mixers. I’m probably being oversensitive.”

“I’m coming over.”

“No don’t. I’ll meet you in the coffee place in the yard. Ten minutes?”

She headed straight out, running in her eagerness. They met on the threshold of the cafe and he swept her up in his long arms and she exhaled a breath that she hadn’t known she was holding. “Who do I need to hex? Or scratch?” he asked, tipping her chin back to look at her.

“No-one. I’m fine. Just over emotional and missing you. Tell me all about your day. What’s your roommate like?”

“He’s a complete douche, entertainingly. He’s a WASPy warlock who has clearly never had to work for anything and he hates me because I’m a familiar which he thinks makes me an inferior species. He actually complained to the arcane proctor that it was unsanitary to make him share accommodation with livestock.”

Betty gaped at him. “What happened?” 

“They offered me a complimentary upgrade to a single. I turned it down. He needs to learn that not everything is going to go his way. I have a higher tolerance than him for uncomfortable. I ate cat food for sixty years. What’s yours like?”

“She hates me. But you might like her. She’s into movies I guess. She’s got a huge poster. Black Narcissus?”

“Oh dear. Oneiric dark fairy tale. Nuns driven mad with lust in the Himalayas. Weird vibe like you said, lurid. Great movie but disturbing as all hell.”

“We should have got an apartment together and ignored what my parents wanted. This year’s going to suck.”

“Oh I don’t know. Maybe we’ll have some fun with them.”

Betty doubted it. When she got back to her room after coffee and kisses, Donna was hunched over a dusty spell book translating an incantation. She looked up as Betty entered. “Try not to listen Betty. It’s much too advanced for you. I’d hate you to try something that will end up hurting you or turning you into a toad.” Betty heard the sotto voce “An improvement perhaps,” as she was sure she was meant to. She couldn’t prevent herself from rising to the bait.

“Actually I’ve done some advanced casting myself. I did a transubstantiation when I’d only known I was a witch for a week.”

“Goodness. What did you transform?”

“Jughead, my boyfriend. He was a cat….”

“Well, that does demonstrate some ambition doesn’t it? And it was almost successful. He could pass for human… mostly.” Betty bit back her retort. There was no point letting Donna know that she was getting to her. That was just what she wanted.

Things got even worse at the orientation for freshman arcanes. Betty and Jug went in together for moral support. There was Donna, whispering and giggling as she looked over at them. There was Bret, tall, Aryan, smug, looking at everyone like they were sea monsters and he was Perseus, come to slay them. The senior students arranged ice breaker activities and eventually, to her dismay, Betty found herself in a group with both Donna and Bret. She looked helplessly across the room and Jug mouthed “I’m sorry” back at her. The task was to list the things that they had in common and then things that set them apart. They had listed a shared if only tangential interest in coffee and politics before giving up on commonalities and moving to differences. “I guess we all know one difference that Betty has,” Donna remarked. “None of us has been so horny that we transformed our familiars into humans so we could have sex with them. It’s definitely kinky but I am dubious that a dumb beast can give proper consent.”

Bret grinned wolfishly, “And it seems a little much to force another student share a dorm room with the animal just because you won’t splash out for a sex aid. That poor creature can’t honestly do much for you can he?” Suddenly Jug was there behind her, lunging toward Bret. “Oh look here he is. It’s the pussy. Hey everyone, did you know we have class with a pussy? We must not be meeting our dumb beast affirmative action target since we’re recruiting them now.”

“Oh no worries Bret, at least we know you filled the smug prick quota,” Jug said lurching forwards.

She jumped up and put her hand on his chest. “Come on Jug. Let’s just go. There’s nothing for us here.” He glanced at her and decided that orientation was not the place for a brawl. They walked out together, Jug still clenching his fists and looking murderous. “I’m so sorry Juggie. I should never have told her. She made me mad and I boasted about transforming you. Now they’re never going to let it go.”

Over the next few weeks she kept patiently explaining to people that Jug was always a human, that he had only looked like a cat, that she had reversed a transformation rather than initiated one. It made no difference; she had the reputation as the girl so desperate to be laid that she turned her cat into a man. He was referred to among the student body as Kitty or Pussy or Fluff or Tiddles. She was the cat lady. She began to spend more of her time with temporals from her Psych classes. He was taking some literature courses and could often be found waiting outside her lecture halls typing submissions for The Crimson or The Tuesday Magazine. They’d work together in one of the quiet corners of the library, quietly discussing their incantation translations or their temporal essays with varying degrees of mutual support. “...so I’m not sure whether to write about Carl Rogers or Freud. What do you think?” He didn’t reply and she realised he was staring over her shoulder. There was a bird on the windowsill. He was transfixed. Some days it seemed he was just feeling more feline. Bret’s obsession with lifting free weights for two hours every morning was a godsend as she would sneak over to Jug’s dorm at six and they’d commiserate on their latest humiliations before going out to do battle again each day. 

One morning she was in a runes seminar with a couple of the witches who had been less hostile towards her. One of them confided that she wished that her boyfriend was a familiar so she could command him. “He’s, shall we say, a little selfish in the bedroom. It’d be great if I just got to order him. I’d be like, you just mind to your business down there for the next twenty minutes or so. Good for you girl. You’re in charge. Don’t you mind Donna. I expect she’s just jealous. Her familiar hates her so much she has to keep him in a cage or he’d be gone.” Betty was intrigued.

“Well I don’t know if it’s different because Jug’s a human but I can’t command him. He does what he wants. He doesn’t feel obliged to obey me. Believe me, I tried.”

“You just aren’t doing it right then. It has to be a definite command. You can’t just say “I’d like a foot rub.” You have to be like, “Give me a foot rub right the hell now. Or whatever else it is you want.” You’re the witch, he’s the familiar. That’s what it means. Otherwise he’d be as powerful as you. He’s just, like, your helper.”

Intrigued, she decided that she’d have to try it out. Donna was out on a field trip for her temporal Geography course all weekend so she had a fine opportunity. Later when they were watching a movie on her laptop and he’d eaten three quarters of the popcorn, she rattled the bowl and said “Hey Jug, make some more?”

“In a while’ he replied, kissing her head. “I’m comfy.”

“Jug, make popcorn now,” she said in a firm voice. He stood instantly but his face revealed his complete shock and betrayal. 

“Oh my God. No, don’t. Oh I’m so sorry Jug. I didn’t think it was true. I didn’t think it would work. No more popcorn. Oh forgive me.” That look again, “Christ no, you don’t have to forgive me. I wish you would but it’s up to you.” She was crying in panic now, holding his hand as he stood by the couch. “Oh Jug, why didn’t you tell me?”

“I didn’t think it was relevant. I thought you knew that I’d do anything for you because I love you. You don’t have to command me. I choose to try to make you happy. I didn’t think that you wanted to…”

“I don’t. Of course I don’t. I’ll never, never do it again. I’m so sorry. I want to make you happy. We’re equals. Absolutely.”

“Yeah but now that’s because you say we are, not because it’s just a fact. I’m kind of tired Betts. I’m going to go back to my dorm. If that’s OK with you obviously.” 

She stood and looked at him. “I wish that you’d stay but you go or you stay as you wish. Always. Is there a charm or anything so I can give up that power? I don’t want it.”

“No, it’s just what it is to be a familiar. There’s a story. I daresay one of your well informed friends will tell you it in due course. See you tomorrow Betts.” She cried all night but at five there was a knock at her door. He looked bad, red eyed and wild haired.

“I hate fighting with you. I’m sorry I got pissy. Or hissy.” He smiled weakly at the pun. “It’s not your fault I’m a familiar. I should’ve explained and we could have talked about it.”

“No, it’s not your fault. I was so wrong. I promise you that I will never, never do it again. Come to bed. You can be in charge.”

Later he told her the story of why he was a familiar. His grandfather, the first Forsythe Pendleton Jones, for whom he was named, had been a witch’s lover back at the turn of the twentieth century. He’d been a bad guy, a drinker, a gambler, an abuser. He’d beaten her and as revenge she’d cursed his line. “All of us would be familiars, subject to the will of witches. Familiars are almost all animals, when we’re human it’s generally because of a hex or a curse. That’s why a lot of witches don’t trust us. Even though I didn’t choose it, didn’t do anything to deserve their suspicion. The witch is dead, the curse can’t be lifted. All of my descendants, if I have any, will be familiars.”

“So when Agnes made you into a cat?"

“No, that was me. I suggested it. She wouldn’t have forced me. But then she got annoyed with me and commanded me not to ask her to turn me back. Even when I knew that the day was coming when she wouldn’t have the power I couldn’t do anything about it.”

Betty wanted to know more about the curse. She asked one of her professors where she could find out about historical hexes and she directed her to the esoteric library to look at the proceedings of the Sorcery Courts of Chancery. Apparently if someone wanted to have a curse lifted they could apply to the court and the witch could be ordered to reverse the enchantment if it was deemed unjust. It took a few hours, as she sneezed through dusty parchment, wishing that there was a little less Luddite reluctance to digitise the magical archives, but finally she found the case of Jones vs Dallas. The petitioner admitted his offence against the witch, Jane, but was claiming that to curse his line in perpetuity was disproportionate to his crime. His testimony blamed his dependence upon alcohol and how it had led him to mistreat Jane. He vowed that he had turned away from drink and was trying to be a better man. He said that he had married and that his wife was pregnant, that he was ashamed to pass on such a legacy of subjugation to his child. She was beginning to feel sorry for him when he began to list the ways in which Jane had provoked him to violence. She pushed away the book in a cloud of dust and disgust, “Nope, Jones. Just nope,” she muttered. Eventually curiosity overcame her revulsion and she found the page and finished reading the transcript. The judge had given her ruling, that Jones was a reprobate but that his children shouldn’t suffer for it and that Jane was ordered to reverse her hex. The witch herself stood and began to berate the court. She told the judge that she would not do as she was ordered and as she stood before the court she muttered an incantation which transformed her instantly into a dry leaf which blew into the fireplace despite the fact that no windows were open. There was a brief eruption of flame and Jane Dallas was no more. The witch was dead and the curse must stand.

Betty spent time investigating ways to reverse spells cast by other witches but in a magical world where there were few hard and fast rules this seemed to be the universal. Only the witch that casts a spell can reverse it. Betty liked Jughead being her familiar, she wouldn’t want to change it, but there were moments when she allowed herself to think about her children. If her children were his then her sons and daughters would inherit Jane’s curse too. She wanted them to be free to choose in a way that Jughead hadn’t been. They might want to be surgeons or engineers, painters or mechanics. She wanted it reversed. She didn’t say this to him, not wanting him to imagine that she thought being a familiar was an affliction, was anything to disparage. Not wanting to talk to him about his children being her children, not yet.

The year progressed with innumerable slights and indignities from Bret and Donna. They seemed to coordinate their attacks. In class there had been a discussion about spells to project oneself into an animal, perhaps an owl, to gain the power of flight and Donna raised a hand to say “That’ll make a change for Betty, normally she likes to have the animal in her rather than vice versa.” Everyone laughed, even people she thought were friendly, even the professor. There was the morning that Jug called her because Bret had drawn a circle on their dorm room bathroom floor before he went to class so Jug was trapped in it. After that he always had a damp cloth to hand in there so he could wipe off the chalk. There was the day that someone (definitely Donna) released a mouse in their ethics of magic seminar and she had to get Jug out before he saw it and the pouncing began. Someone (Bret) put up posters of kittens and wrote underneath, “Betty Jones’ first litter,” which upset her more than she could possibly explain to anyone. Then there was the catnip in the laundromat fabric softener that made Jug almost crazy for a week because everyone used it. He endured all of it without complaint while she ranted. “They’re jealous Betts. Neither of them is worth a damn. You know why she keeps Oliver in that cage right?”

“No? I hadn’t thought. Why doesn’t she just command him not to fly away?”

“Oh she has. He can’t fly away. His secret plan is to fly into the window glass and break his neck. That’s how much he hates her.”

“I’ve never understood. How do you talk to them, the other familiars? They can’t speak?”

“I can just understand the barks and tweets and wing flapping. Kind of half telepathy I guess. Like it depends, with a dog it’s easy, kind of pictures in my mind, short sentences, almost all imperatives. Corvids are great to talk to, full, grammatically constructed sentences in my head, elegant turns of phrase, puns. Poe did the raven so dirty; he’d have been coming out with witty epigrams not just saying “Nevermore” like a dumbass. Silas, you know the scarab, he uses words but also weird pictograms too, symbols, the antennae waving. It’s like when someone speaks with a heavy accent, you have to really focus to follow along. With the canary it’s kind of a feeling and a picture. He imagines himself flying into the window, crashing and then like a feeling of pure flight, freedom. I wish there was something I could do but I’m a cat who’s gone cold turkey on canaries.”

“The poor little thing. And I’ve barely seen Bret cast at all. He does these very basic transformations and a little clairvoyance and that’s it. He says it’s because his familiar died and he hasn’t been assigned a new one yet. Should it take this long? And how did his familiar die? It’s fishy.”

“Well all I know is that, between Baltazar dying and me turning up, Agnes was without a familiar for three days. And we’ve been here eight weeks. So too long.”

Now that they had voiced their suspicions of their tormentors they began to go on the offensive rather than playing defense all the time. They hadn’t questioned Bret’s gym regimen because it so conveniently gave them private time together but Jug was suspicious. “Even Archie and Reg take rest days Betts. And Bret is just a little shlubby, there’s not a lot of payoff for fourteen hours a week with the weights. He should be like The Rock.” They decided that finding out what Bret was up to was a public good that justified the use of an enchantment so they worked together to make Jug unobtrusive, not invisible but unnoticeable. He followed Bret when he left the dorm room at six a.m and his suspicions were confirmed when he headed in the opposite direction from the gym, towards the church. He let himself into a small room adjacent to the nave with his own key. Jug lurked outside but the doors were too thick and the windows too high for him to discover what was happening inside. Later he talked with Betty about charms and enchantments they could use to eavesdrop on what was happening in the anteroom but she simply laughed and told him to leave it to her.

Two days later at five thirty Betty, dressed in black running tights and hoodie, crossed the yard and slipped into the church. She pulled a hairpin from her bun and within a couple of minutes she had eased the door that Jug had pointed out to her, noticing that the doorframe was defended with warding runes, no magic would pass that threshold. She pulled the tiny nanny cam out of her pocket and set it up as high as she could reach on a picture rail, silently thanking her capitalist overlords for student prime and overnight shipping. She slipped back out and jogged across campus, a student athlete on her morning run, arriving outside Jug’s dorm at six ten, ready to watch proceedings on her phone from the comfort of her boyfriend’s bed. 

The image was small and a little grainy, but the sound quality was excellent. As soon as Bret opened the door Betty hit the record button. This might need to be saved for posterity. He sat in the corner of the room and pulled out a rosary and began to pray. “Oh, is he just embarrassed about being a person of faith? Oh he shouldn’t have to hide that,” Betty exclaimed.

“Yeah but he’s a Catholic Betts. The witch community hasn’t had the best relationship with the Vatican. I think we can still legitimately hold a grudge about the inquisition. Three hundred thousand killed at a conservative estimate, maybe millions. And a hundred thousand people, mostly women, executed for witchcraft. No way of knowing how many were of the craft, how many were just unpopular or accidentally pregnant or in the way of a philandering husband. So being a Catholic witch is…unusual. Hey wait, someone’s coming in.” Bret was joined at prayer by another man, a monk in a white tunic and black cape. They sat together saying their rosaries for twenty minutes at which point the monk gave a benediction to Bret, his hand on the younger man’s head. 

“My son. You bear your burden with courage,” the monk was saying in accented English. “To be constantly amongst these monsters. It cannot be countenanced. We almost have enough evidence of their organisation to take to the Holy Office. We will show that witchcraft flourishes here, heresy, Satanism, iniquity. The Vatican’s reluctance to begin a crusade will be overcome. If they would but kill a child or desecrate a young woman we would be able to have such a purge that they would never recover. God’s battle would be won. What is the most heinous of their crimes?”

“A young woman turned a cat into a man to satisfy her carnal lust. But I don’t know how to prove he was a cat. He looks like a man now. There is another of the females, Donna, who has unnatural age. She lusts after me, she told me yesterday about seeing the spire hoisted onto the Chrysler building. That was 1930. She looks like a girl of eighteen. Again, I don’t know how to prove the offence against God.”

“Then you need to redouble your efforts, try to encourage them to more ambitious degeneracy. The sooner we have it the sooner you can return to the seminary. You have been using the tricks you were taught by the conjurer?”

“I have but Father, they see that I have no familiar. They will become suspicious.”

“Why could you not simply bring a dog to your room and say it is your familiar animal?”

“The man that was a cat can speak to familiars. He would know at once unless I prevent him. I might silence him.”

“If you can do it without detection. If not we have to proceed without it. Be swift my son. Gather what we need and we will have a new auto-da-fé. They will all pay on the rack for their sin.” 

Neither Betty nor Jug could believe the horror that Bret and his mentor planned to bring down upon them. It was simply unthinkable that anyone could desire such wanton murder and destruction. “I just don’t get it Jug. Why can’t they just let us be? We aren’t doing anything to them.”

“It’s got to be power I guess. It always is. Some crackpot sees the power of the magisterium waning. If they can give people a threat, something to fear, and then offer them protection against it, they regain their influence, their status. I daresay that they’d promise to build a wall to keep us out but they’d imagine we’d fly over it on broomsticks or some shit. Old white guys, scared as hell and taking it out on anyone not exactly like them.”

“I don’t want you staying here. Bret was seriously considering offing you. It’s not safe.”

“What’s he gonna do? Put me in a box and cut me in half? Throw me out the window? If he does I promise I’ll land on my feet. If it makes you happy we’ll cast some protection spells here so he can’t attack me in my sleep.”

“Oh shit. Like Houdini in reverse! He’s like a stage magician trying to convince us he’s a warlock when Houdini had the gift and pretended to be a temporal. That’s what Nana was trying to tell us.”

“Yeah, helpful as always. Thanks Nana. Hey Betts?” She looked at him enquiringly. “Well since we’re apparently so debauched and degraded shall we at least enjoy it a bit? Come here.”

Betty wandered back to her dorm later feeling as dissolute as Jug could have wanted. Donna was just leaving for her lecture but as she passed she snarked, “Been tom catting with the tom cat?”

Betty grinned at her like a cat that got the canary. “He can be very purr-suasive. Anyway some petting keeps him from becoming a sourpuss.” Weirdly she found it much easier to take her roommate’s taunts lightly now there was an actual existential threat hanging over them all. “Have a mice day Roomie.”


	3. They who talk all day of beauty call all the plain things dirty

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The Night Battles were a part of the practice of the benandanti in Northern Italy in the sixteenth century who were later persecuted by the Inquisition as witches. They would leave their bodies to do battle in the fields against evil spirits, dark witches and the devil who wanted to destroy the crops on Ember Days. There’s a great book by Carlo Ginzburg called The Night Battles about this. I’m failing to read it in Italian at the moment!
> 
> The chapter title is a lyric from a song by The Mountain Goats called Their Gods Do Not Have Surgeons.
> 
> They came like beasts who'd tasted blood  
> First a few and then the flood  
> Coursing over hill and dale  
> Wet paw prints on their bloody trail
> 
> Return the peace you took from me  
> Give me back my community  
> Show us the good will you were shown  
> But leave us alone  
> Yeah, restore  
> The temple  
> Of Isis  
> At Memphis
> 
> Their hunger like a worm inside them  
> No sacred place could be denied them  
> They who talk all day of beauty  
> Call all the plain things dirty
> 
> Melted holes in celluloid  
> Give me back what you've destroyed  
> You who come demanding proof  
> Let your God rebuild this roof  
> Yeah, restore  
> The temple  
> Of Isis  
> At Memphis
> 
> Make it whole again if you can  
> Stand in the smoke and say some prayers  
> Wave your hand
> 
> And restore  
> The temple  
> Of Isis  
> At Memphis

For weeks now Betty had been aware of an idea scratching at the back of her mind like a mouse behind the baseboard. Now, in her lecture on research methods in psychology, she was teasing at it again. It was like when she'd lost a tooth as a kid and she couldn't stop probing the gap with her tongue, only now it was her mind delving into this puzzling void. Donna had told Bret that she was in New York in 1930. She was old, not a new witch. Why was she dragging herself through a Harvard education when she’d probably forgotten more than most of them would ever learn about magic? Did she simply want to show off? Could she be such a narcissist? Everything about her creeped Betty out, the long white socks, the Alice bands, the disturbing film poster. Betty had a flash of inspiration. She quietly opened a browser on her laptop alongside the page where she was making notes. She IMDB-ed Black Narcissus. Filmed in 1947. There was the full cast list, scrolling, scrolling. What she found made her sit back with a gasp, drawing the attention of her nearby classmates. “Sorry, cramp,” she muttered, rubbing her shoulder theatrically. There, on her screen, as Sister Assumpta, Jane Dallas. Alongside the name, a studio photograph. Donna Sweett in the ancient, and not at all dead, flesh. It all made sense. She’d tricked the Chancery Court so that she didn’t have to reverse the hex. Now she was mad because Jug wasn’t being made to suffer enough as a familiar. She must have been loving the cat decades.

Later in the library they tried yet again to make some kind of plan to avoid the return of the inquisition but now they knew they also had to defend themselves against a vengeful witch who was prepared to hold a grudge through the ages. Jughead was keen to challenge Bret to some sort of magical duel but as Betty pointed out there was no way that a fake warlock would willingly put himself up for exposure by agreeing to a fight he couldn’t win. It would simply alert him to the fact they were onto him. Betty talked again about going to the Dean to accuse him of not being a witch. “Like a not a witch hunt? ‘Not a witch, not a witch, burn him?’” Jug smirked.

“Well he has to have lied on his application doesn’t he? If you fake your SAT score you get expelled, so surely saying you’re a warlock when you aren’t ought to incur some sanction.”

“Yeah but then there’ll be all kinds of investigations and bureaucracy and you know he’ll just get away with it. We can't know who else is with them. How did he get admitted at all? He’s got the might of the Holy, Catholic and Apostolic Church behind him or at least the craziest part of it. He’ll just be off, back to his seminary. Hey, idea! We’ve got two distinct nemeses right?”

“Ooh, nice plural.You’re becoming quite the wordsmith aren’t you? A regular Nathaniel Pawthorne, Purrman Catpote…” she stopped because he had his fingers in his ears and was groaning in mock agony at the horror of the terrible puns. “But yeah, we’re fighting on two fronts which sucks strategically.”

He grinned. “So can we get Donna to deal with Bret? I don’t care how rotten she is I’d never hand her over to the inquisition but it’d be poetic to have the witchiest witch deal with their spy. The implication was that she likes him right? So if she found out that he was a fifth columnist she’d be mad as hell. And we know that she isn’t one to forgive and forget.” 

“Yeah but we can’t tell her. She’d always take his word over ours, think we’re tricking her. We need to have her find out for herself.”

“And then, when she’s dealt with that problem we can deal with her. Somehow.”

“OK, so how to play Donna? The movie poster proves she’s a narcissist. She’s advertising the fact. So maybe I could get her to use her skills on Bret." She mulled it over for a moment. "OK, a plan. I just need to try to bond with her which is not going to be easy. I may have to cast an enchantment on you, if that’s OK.” He shrugged in assent.

Back in her dorm room Betty brought out the big guns of the sisterhood, confectionary and vulnerability. Donna found her tearful, sitting on the bed in her pyjamas, eyes red and halfway through a box of chocolate truffles. “Catfight?” she asked. 

“Yeah, I just don’t know whether he only likes me because I’m his witch. Sometimes I want to cast a truth spell to find out everything that’s going on in his head. I guess that’d be really wrong though, right?”

“Oh well I don’t know. Men, well toms in your case, always get the upper hand so if women can level the playing field with a spell that’s only fair isn’t it? I wouldn’t trust him an inch. Bad family. They’re notorious.”

“Is there anyone that you want to use a spell like that on? I see Bret looking at you all the time. Has he said anything about how he feels?”

“Well, obviously he likes me. He just needs to have some courage and say so.”

“Hey so we could both cast a truth enchantment and get some straight talking. Do you know one? Would you help me? I know we got off on the wrong foot but you seem to know so much more than me.” She could see Donna torn between her desire to demonstrate her superiority and her dislike and contempt for a witch who loved her familiar. She was also clearly hoping to spread some discord between Betty and Jughead. No relationship can handle total transparency.

“Fine, I’ll make a list for the potion. You can probably handle mixing that and I’ll cast the runes.” Despite herself Betty enjoyed the challenge of casting the spell and working alongside a fellow witch. Most of the ingredients for the potion were available from the apothecary disguised as a raquetball court in the athletic centre and then she crossed the road to the old burial ground for her graveyard dirt. By the time she returned Donna had drawn the runes and begun the incantation so she quickly made the potion and poured it over their small domestic altar stone. Donna paused the incantation to tell Betty to speak her request to the forces of nature and the earth. 

“I wish for my lover to speak complete truth to me without pretence… tonight.” Donna raised an eyebrow at the qualification but Betty didn’t want to permanently stop Jug from keeping secrets if he needed to. She wanted him to share his thoughts with her willingly, not to be compelled.

“And I wish for Bret Weston Wallis to declare his true feelings towards me when next I meet him. Mother Earth we beseech this gift as your daughters.” She finished the incantation and finished with a dramatic flourish that magically wiped away the runes. Betty’s phone buzzed with a text and she picked it up. There were chunks of text; he clearly had a lot to say. She glanced at his message and her cheeks flared, it was too personal for her to read. She rushed out of the room with her phone, calling him as she went. “Jug, she said as he picked up. 

“Betty, so I have to tell you…”

“No you don’t. Hold on a second. I’ve cast an enchantment on you. I had to get Donna’s trust. So, listen, you can keep texting if you need to and I’ll delete without reading or better still why don’t you write down what you need to say and then you can destroy it tomorrow? It’s only tonight. I’m sorry Jug. I’m hanging up and I’m switching off my ‘phone ’til twelve, OK?”

“I really, really love when you do that thing…” She headed over to the library deleting his texts as she went. She didn’t read them but as she pressed delete she couldn’t help seeing how often he’d written “love” and she smiled to herself. She knew he loved her but it was nice to know how deep it went. The texts came sporadically until midnight and then he called at 12.03. “Did you read any of that?”

“No, of course not. I’m sorry I had to do it but I think we got her. She cast it on Bret so he’ll tell her the truth when he sees her. We should be there for that.”

“I don’t mind you knowing that I love you Betts. But thanks for not reading. I kind of shocked myself a bit, too raw a look at my own psyche.”

The next day they surreptiously followed Donna into breakfast. Brett was already there, finishing his paleo breakfast hash as she queued for a wheatgrass shot. He strode over. “Donna Sweett. I have to say, you are an evil, ungodly, unholy, foul, corrupt whore of Beelzebub and I will not be satisfied until I have seen you put to the flame. I am working to gather the evidence for my mentors to take to the Holy Office and they will bring a great vengeance upon you and your wicked brethren with holy fire. And your clothes are weird.”

The whole dining room was silent, staring at Donna and Bret as they faced each other in an epic stand off by the smoothie bar. Many of the students were temporals and Donna held her rage rather than expose herself as arcane. She plastered a fake smile onto her face and turned to face the gawpers. “Well done Bret, you’ve nailed that speech. Really good. Hey everyone, courtyard theatre. The Crucible. Two weeks time, bring your friends.” She took a deep theatrical bow. Bret was standing, dazed and bewildered, unable to understand why he had so comprehensively blown his cover. He was still holding his fork. Jug swiped it from his hand and prodded the tines into his forearm. 

“Hey Bret, I checked, looks like you’re done.” Bret stared at him and then made a break for it, running at full speed out of the dining area and into the yard. The temporals went back to their breakfasts but Betty and Jug followed Donna as she stepped outside and began an incantation, her eyes half closed in concentration. She made a gesture and Betty saw a yellow shape dart into the quad. Jug, standing beside her, breathed out “Oliver.” Bret was still running but then he seemed to miss his footing and fell forward. As he fell, he simply vanished. Then Oliver darted down to where he had disappeared, wheeling round in the air before heading towards the plate glass windows of the refectory. Donna simply held up a hand and Oliver fell to the ground. She picked him up and headed back across the lawns to her dorm.

“Did she just evaporate Bret?” Betty gasped.

“Nah, she turned him into a bug, Might have been a mayfly. Oliver ate him.” Jug was horrified but, simultaneously, impressed by her skill.

“Oh my God! Then what happened to Oliver? Was he going to do it? Kill himself?”

“Yeah, she commanded him to stop flying before he could finish the job. Wow, Bret, what a way to go. I guess he didn’t know anything about it. Did we just get a guy killed?”

“I think technically he got himself killed and you heard what he wanted to do to us. It was self defence.” Betty wasn’t inclined to mourn for someone who could gleefully plot a massacre.

“Well we need to work out how to defend ourselves against Donna now. That was some pretty fancy casting, no potion, no runes, just an incantation and a reluctant familiar. She’s really strong.”

Betty felt nervous too, having seen Donna’s power but understood that her rage came from pain, not ideology as Bret’s had. “Yeah, but hear me out. She has kind of got a legitimate grievance hasn’t she? Like some guy beat her up, abused her. I’m not saying she’s right to take it out on you but she deserved justice didn’t she? She’s problematic, no doubt, but I guess that when people say women are problematic they often just seem to mean that they won’t tolerate any shit. I think we ought to give her a chance.”

They came up with the plan in Jughead’s now large single dorm room. Some days after Bret’s demise in the beak of a canary a monk had come and packed his things. “Has Bret dropped out?” Jug had asked innocently. The monk had nodded nervously and made the sign of the cross as if he were in the presence of an evil spirit. Betty crossed him on the threshold and he looked scandalised as she kissed her boyfriend and disappeared inside. “They won’t give up will they?” she said, stating a fact rather than asking a question.

“Nope. They never have so far. But we're still here. We’re tough to kill. Now, I’ve been thinking about Donna. I may have an idea. And Wednesday will be the perfect day for it, an Ember Day.”

“And the last day before Christmas break. OK, tell me.”

Ember days were important dates in the arcane students’ calendar. They dated from ancient prehistory, occurring four times a year to mark the turning of the seasons. They represented times of change, reviewing and laying to rest what is done, preparing for what is to come. These particular ember days fell just before the winter solstice. It was the time when the darkness was at its most powerful, when in ancient days humans huddled together for comfort and hoped that the sun would return, whispering incantations and charms to keep away the rising tide of death, pestilence and hunger. All the arcanes in the great university came together with their familiars in one of the meeting rooms just as twilight was closing in, both to celebrate the end of the old year and to cast enchantments together to welcome the new. It was also a time to heal grievances and offer forgiveness. In the dark days, before medicine and plenty, no-one knew who would survive the long winter and it was well to make oneself right with the world before slipping into the afterlife. Tonight students and professors mingled together, sharing jokes and wishing each other a happy holiday whether Christmas or Yule, Saturnalia or Soyal. In the middle of the festivities Jug jumped onto a chair and tapped his glass with a long, ringed finger. Everyone looked towards this presumptuous freshman, not even a warlock, a familiar.

“Hi everyone. I’m Jughead Jones. I have a request of the community. There is a witch among us who my family have wronged. I want to ask her forgiveness on this solstice ember day. Donna? Jane? On behalf of my line, my grandfather and my descendants we beg your pardon for the wrongs done to you. If you will forgive us I further ask you to lift your curse as was commanded of you by the Sorcery Court of Chancery in 1908. If you will not I ask for redress in a night battle.”

Donna stepped forward. “I forgive nothing. I will not lift my curse. You and your litters will be familiars for all of the remaining generations left to you. You haven’t even felt the curse. Your witch is foolish and besotted and fails to command you properly. She permits you to slake your lust with her. I hope that your kittens have witches who better understand how to rule over a familiar and don’t spare the rod. And as for a night battle I would not demean myself to fight against a beast. I am a full sorceress and would never stoop so low.”

“Then fight me,” Betty said, stepping forward. “You’re right, Jughead and I are happy to be witch and familiar. We’ve chosen each other. But I hope to have his children one day, to be a family.” They had anticipated that it would fall to Betty to engage Donna in the night battle but they hadn’t spoken about her personal stake in the fight. She hoped she hadn’t spooked him. When she looked at him she saw that he had tears unshed in his eyes and a goofy grin on his face. Not spooked. He reached out and took her hand as she continued. “I want my children to have the choices that everyone else has, not to be demeaned by people like you or be at risk of mistreatment just because some people don’t understand their value. Lift the curse you have put on my unborn children.”

The Dean stepped between the parties. “Ms Sweett, if you are subject to a ruling by the court you must obey it or you will be asked to leave this university. If you insist on the battle you will be expelled. Do you still demand it?”

“I do,” Donna’s chin jutted and her eyes flashed.

“Ms Cooper, you’re a new witch. Do you really understand what’s required of you? The night battle means that you leave your body and fight against your opponent in the fields of the spirit. She may disguise herself or use deception to avoid your blows, you may do the same. Whoever cannot bear the blows and returns to her body first is the loser. If you are incapacitated and cannot return you will wander those dark fields forever.”

“I understand.” 

“Then prepare yourselves.”

Betty and Jug retreated to a corner of the room so that Betty could enter the trance that would enable her to leave her body. She had spent the week reading everything she could about the ancient witchcraft practice that she was about to embark upon. She would leave her body, her travelling spirit was supposed to fight with Donna. When she was sure Donna was in the spirit world she would return and Jug would help her back into her body. “Don’t be a hero Betts. It’s not part of the plan. Come back quick and come back safe. No need to defeat her out there. The real battle is right here. It’s being fought for us by a canary.”

Donna was in the opposite corner of the room with Oliver, who was out of his cage and clearly under a command not to fly into the glass. Then it was time and Betty closed her eyes and allowed herself to drift as she had been practising with varying degrees of success. Suddenly she felt the grip of her body loosen and she flew out through her own mouth with a nauseating wrench. The world became translucent and she drifted through a wall rather than trying to use a doorway. Outside, instead of the stone and grass of Harvard Yard she found herself in the agrarian landscape of sixteenth century Europe. Cold earth, the stunted tops of root vegetables, bare trees, surrounded her in the moonlight. The ground was cloying and heavy. It made it hard to run, her breath rasping in her lungs, her feet encased in clods. She searched the ground and with a great effort picked up a heavy branch as a weapon. She didn’t think she would be able to wield it but it was important to look like she was at least trying. There was no sign of her opponent, just a thin pale horse, head bowed in the moonlit field. She looked about frantically, starting at shadows and the sound of wind in the bare branches. There was nowhere safe, no-one to help her. On she ran, slow as a nightmare, dragging her branch. Her foot caught in a furrow and she fell, the smell of the dirt in her nostrils, a jolt of pain in an ankle that she knew she didn’t have. She struggled to her feet.

There was a flicker at the edge of her vision and then, with a crash a heavy blow hit her in the side of her head. An invisible assailant. She staggered and collapsed back onto the icy earth on one knee. She had no body and yet she felt the warm, sticky blood on her face. The blow landed again, this time across her ribs, stopping her breath. She looked up as Donna materialised through the blood, raising her weapon to strike again and Betty dropped her branch. “Is this how he made you feel Donna? I’m so sorry that happened to you. I’m sorry that no-one made it right.”

The blow didn’t land. Donna gasped out a sob. “I trusted him and he almost killed me. No-one helped me. No-one. Why should I be better than him? Why do I have to forgive? That’s not my responsibility.”

“No, it’s true. You can choose not to forgive. That's your right. But it won’t make anything better. It’s your choice. Will you release us from the curse, sister?”

“I will not.”

“Then I can’t help you. I have to protect my family.” Betty picked up a sharp flint from the cold ground and dug it hard into her palm, the pain driving her swooping back into her body where Jug held her lips open as she entered, stoppering her mouth with his own once she was back. On the other side of the room the witches gasped. Oliver had flown into Donna’s mouth, blocking it. Her spirit rushed back with the sound of dry leaves in a storm but couldn’t gain access, the feathers forming a barrier. She tried again and again, Oliver’s tiny body pounded with her attempts. No-one intervened. This was between a witch and her familiar, it was no-one’s place.

“Oh Jug, she’ll kill him,” Betty whispered hoarsely.

“She will. Resisting her means death. He knew it. He chose it.”

There was a tiny, sharp cry and a moan from the assembled crowd as Oliver succumbed. Now there was no way for Donna to re-enter her body and her spirit seemed to expand to fill the whole room. A booming inhuman voice screamed, “Very well, I revoke the curse. No more descendants of a Forsythe Pendleton Jones will be born as familiars.” Betty ran over to Donna’s body and carefully and tenderly removed the broken body of the dead canary and Donna plunged back into her body, with a terrible scream. 

The Dean stepped forward. "Donna, Jane, whatever your true name. You are expelled from this university. I shall tell the community that you are never to be allocated another familiar. Jones translated your familiar’s account of your abuse. It is shocking for a witch to harm her own familiar. You will never repeat the offence.”

Betty spent the night in Jug’s dorm room so she did not have to see Donna packing. They anonymously sent a recording of Bret’s assignation with the monk to the Dean, hoping that she would alert the arcane community of the threat. As they packed to go back to Elm Street for the festive break the next day, Betty took Jug’s hand. “You’re still my familiar though, right? I’m still your witch?”

“Yeah. But that’s because I want to be. Now my kids can be whatever they want. Their lives will be their own...unless my daughters are witches I guess.” He grinned at her. It was an understanding.

_______________________________________

Jughead and Betty sat on the bedroom window seat, looking out as the last flakes of snow settled on Elm Street. The door was open the regulation three inches. Jug was still smarting from his encounter with Mr Cooper over breakfast when the older man had jovially clapped him on the back, making him jump about three feet into the air. “You’re as nervous as a cat in a room full of rocking chairs young man. You don’t need to be worried. I won’t get my hunting rifle out unless I hear you padding about in the night.” He laughed but, since that was exactly what Jughead had been doing in the silvery early dawn, the joke, if that was what it was, did not serve to make him feel more at home.

Christmas morning chez Cooper seemed a little fraught. Mrs Cooper was cooking up a storm and refusing all offers of help, Betty’s niece and nephew had been careening about the halls screaming since they arrived with their mother and father an hour ago. Polly occasionally looked up over the rim of her Bloody Mary and murmured “Calm down now, munchkins,” in as ineffectual way as could be imagined. Mr Cooper and his son in law were already drinking scotch in the den which, given his family history with alcohol was not something with which Jug had any inclination to get involved.

As they looked out, Archie appeared in the yard, wearing an absurd snowsuit and waving a shovel. Betty hoisted the window open and they leaned out. “Hey Jughead, my dad and I are going to shovel snow to help some of the old folks. Work up an appetite before dinner. You wanna come help? Weird weather, I walked Vegas this morning, there isn’t a flake on Main Street and here we are with a settled five inches.”

Jug looked at Betty a little guiltily. “I guess I’d better help. It’s my snow. If some old geezer falls and breaks a hip I’ll feel awful.”

She looked up at him. “OK. But thank you Jug. It was such a beautiful gift. I love it and I love you.”


End file.
